The US government’s investment in Indian securities, including equities and long term debt, declined more than 35 per cent to $59 billion last year compared to 2010.
The American government held Indian securities worth $91.49 billion at the end of 2010 compared to holdings worth $59 billion last year, according to latest official data.
The securities comprise equities, long term and short term debts. America’s holdings of Indian equities alone were worth $55 billion in 2011.
According to preliminary annual report on US holdings of foreign securities, America’s holdings of India’s long term and short term debts were worth $3 billion and $1 billion, respectively, last year.
The data is based on a survey jointly carried out by the US Treasury Department, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.
In 2010, the US government held Indian equities to the tune of $86.45 billion and long term debt worth $4.4 billion. The holdings of short term debt was just $614 million.
“The stock of foreign securities for December 31, 2011, reported in this survey may not, for a number of reasons, correspond to the stock of foreign securities on December 31, 2010...,” the US Treasury said in the preliminary annual report.
Overall, the US held foreign securities worth $6.84 trillion at the end of 2011, with overseas equities alone accounting for $4.5 trillion.
At the end of 2010 too, the value of foreign securities was almost same at $6.76 trillion while the amount of overseas equities was slightly higher at $4.65 trillion.
In terms of America’s exposure to overseas securities, India was at the 26th position in 2011.
The maximum holding of the world’s largest economy last year was in UK securities at $989 billion, followed by Canada ($736 billion), Cayman Islands ($709 billion), Japan ($509 billion), Australia ($334 billion) and France ($306 billion).
Other nations in the top ten were France ($306 billion), Switzerland ($292 billion), Germany ($266 billion), Netherlands ($242 billion) and Brazil ($196 billion).
Among the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), America had the highest exposure to Brazilian securities last year. This was followed by China ($77 billion), South Africa ($71 billion) and India ($ 59 billion). Details of Russia were not available.